The Girl Who Dared

An assortment of relatives come to visit John Hamilton at his isolated house on an island, connected to the mainland by a causeway. The local legend is that a hundred years earlier a pirate ship had sunk there -- the remains can still be seen offshore -- and one night a year, this night, the ghost of the pirate captain can be seen from the shore. Then one of the houseguests is killed and the movie shifts gears.

It starts off as a lighthearted old-dark-house/mystery/comedy from Republic under the direction of Howard Bretherton, the studio's reliable jack-of-all-genres, and the B-list acting talent available for the studio's non-western programmers are up making the most of their roles and the spooky camerawork of Bud Thackery. It maintains its interest right to the end, although the mystery aspect of the movie is lazily handled; still, that fits right in with its multi-genre script, and more in keeping with its sense of being a mood piece, rather than a serious effort.

Okay, you've likely seen the format before—a creepy isolated house, a series of murders, an attractive cast that includes the murderer, and an amateur sleuth. But also throw in a batch of radium a full year before the A-bomb, plus a purported ghost, for good measure. Surprisingly, the rather murky whodunit is not uppermost, instead it's the characters and atmosphere. What it all adds up to is a decent little programmer for wartime audiences and even for later folks taking a break from the computer.

You just know from the outset that despite appearances Blair (Cookson) can't be the bad guy, he's just too good-looking. Besides, the winsome Ann (Gray) takes a shine to him, and you know how Hollywood is in that regard. It's an attractive cast of vets and up and comers, but I did get confused at times with the similar names and appearances. Plus, the reveal scene was much too brief, like someone's contract had suddenly run out. Nonetheless, that one ghost scene was truly spooky, along with the usual secret passages, shadowy rooms, and stormy nights. Come to think of it, I miss old b&w for the effects that color simply cannot duplicate—new Hollywood should loosen up! Anyway, it's a fun little hour with a gang of Hollywood pro's and an old dark house. So how can you lose.

"Beau" (John Hamilton) and "Chattie" (Vivien Oakland) invite a rather eclectic mix of folks to join them for a party at their remote island home. Or do they? The arrival of their guests proves quite bemusing as they didn't actually ask anyone! Who has lured these people here and why? Well body number one arrives shortly afterwards (then disappears) and as others soon start to mount up, we have a mystery that it falls to mechanic "Blair" (Peter Cookson) and the suspicious "Ann" (Lorna Gray) to try and solve before they, too, go the way of the dodo at the hands of the famed ghost of this ramshackle pile. It's not very often we see a geiger counter feature in a murder mystery, but armed with it's glowing light and a bit of light-heartedness, we race through an hour amiably. Nobody will take any acting or writing plaudits from this, but as a standard Saturday afternoon feature, it does fine and probably have inspired countless editions of "Scooby Do"!

The other reviews raise pretty obviously legitimate criticisms of this film, but I love it to death. Plot-wise, it's not particularly ambitious, and the racist representation of the servant is cringe- worthy. But I strangely find the movie enchanting and can watch it over and over. It's gorgeously atmospheric--the kind of cinematography I just eat up. The love story is modestly feasible, with two likable actors inhabiting those roles. I try to watch as many "old dark house" films as I can, because I love the look of them, I love murder mysteries, and it's a nice way to understand some of the conventions, fashions, trends, and language of the 30s and 40s. Unfortunately this film is not available on DVD, as far as I can tell. It streams on amazon, but you never know when those things are going to disappear. Again, this film is not technically a *10*, but I find it beautiful and absorbing, with the quintessential "old dark house" elements pure and strong.

"The Girl Who Dared" sounds more like a Western adventure instead of a B old-dark-house mystery, but the latter is what it is. This fast (under an hour), breezy film is something of a variation of "And Then There Were None," and actually beat the film version of the Agatha Christie novel to the screens by a year! It leaves no convention unexplored and no cliché unplumbed, and the identity of the killer is more random than motive-inspired. But it is competently done, with some interesting camera work for such a cheapie, and a couple decent plot twists. The trapping of the killer is unique, too. The cast performs competently, and some of the actors play against their usual types, particularly Roy Barcroft, normally a Western and Serial heavy who here plays the hotheaded, jealous ex-husband of one of the key characters, and Kirk "Superman" Alyn, as the equally hot-headed brother of the "Girl" of the title. John "Perry White" Hamilton also enjoys a larger and different kind of role than he was normally given. If only the filmmakers had been so generous with Willie Best, who once again shuffles around as a pop-eyed, comic relief servant who is afraid of his own shadow. All in all, it's worth an hour of a movie buff's time.